While her husband was imprisoned and her sons attended Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, Kendra took care of Ariana. Rumours, spread by people such as Muriel and her cousin Lancelot, suggested that Kendra was keeping her "Squib" daughter locked up in a cellar. When Ariana was fourteen years old, she lost control of her magic, and the explosion caused by a Backfiring Jinx killed Kendra.

After Kendra's death, the cause of which "nobody ever seemed sure" (according to Muriel), Ariana was taken care of by her older brother Albus. She was eventually killed in a three-way duel between Albus, Aberforth, and Gellert Grindelwald.

Physical appearance

Kendra had jet black hair which she tended to wear in a high bun, dark eyes, high cheekbones, and a straight nose. Harry Potter, upon seeing a photograph of her, thought she looked Native American, possibly indicating her heritage. He also thought her face had a "carved quality", and noted her expression as being "formally composed".

Personality and traits

"I knew my brother, Potter. He learned secrecy at our mother's knee. Secrets and lies, that's how we grew up, and Albus... he was a natural."

Little is known about Kendra Dumbledore, but much was said about her in gossip. Muriel deemed her a proud, terrifying woman who cared a great deal for her reputation and pretended not to be Muggle-born, apparently aspiring to higher social status. However, Muriel gossiped maliciously about many people, thus her opinion is not necessarily near to the truth. Statements made by her son Aberforth suggest that Kendra made keeping the secret of her daughter's condition her priority, and was strict with her children about following her example. She seems to have kept herself isolated from other people. Given her manner of death and Aberforth's claim that he was able to get Ariana to eat and to calm down when Kendra could not, she may have had a difficult relationship with her daughter, as well as her sons.

Relationships

Family

"[...] my father went after the bastards that did it, and attacked them. And they locked him up in Azkaban for it. He never said why he'd done it, because if the Ministry had known what Ariana had become, she'd have been locked up in St Mungo's for good... We had to keep her safe and quiet. We moved house, put it about she was ill, and my mother looked after her, and tried to keep her calm and happy."

Kendra was devastated by her daughter's attack. Percival Dumbledore, her husband, retaliated against the Muggle boys who assaulted Ariana, and was sent to Azkaban. He never told the Ministry of Magic his reasons, knowing that if her condition were discovered, Ariana would be permanently confined to St Mungo's as a threat to the Statute of Secrecy. To maintain this secrecy, Kendra moved her family to Godric's Hollow and looked after Ariana. However, they may not have been very close, as Ariana's brother Aberforth was the only one able to keep her calm. Eventually, Ariana accidentally killed her mother in an explosion of uncontrollable magic.[4]

"'The Warlock's Hairy Heart', however, does not appear to have been modified or much criticised in the hundreds of years since it was first written; the story as I eventually read it in the original runes was almost exactly that which my mother had told me."

Etymology

Kendra is a name of disputed origin. It may come from Anglo-Saxon meaning "understanding, knowledge". It may be a variation of the English name Kenda, meaning "water baby", or Dakota, meaning "magical power". Alternatively, it may come from the name Kendrick, which is either derived from Welsh for "greatest champion" or Anglo-Saxon for "family ruler".